Climbing a Mountain Takes Time

[Andy Sjostrom]

We're on a long running mountain climbing expedition. It's about endurance and sometimes looking down realizing the long way we have already come is important. Let me explain!<br /><br />When Microsoft released Windows NT 3.1 in August 1993 they said they had started a mountain climbing expedition. The long term goal was to become the major player in server and network operating systems. I even have a Swiss Army Knife from those days branded: "Windows NT Expedition". August 1993 is ten years ago, and Microsoft has become a major player, but still has ways to go to become <b>the</b> major player. Competition is fierce and Linux has proven itself to be a potent competitor. Even in other markets such as word processing and spreadsheets, progress has not been a simple matter of course. Climbing a mountain takes time. <!><br /><br />In my opinion, Microsoft's real bet on mobile devices was placed in April 2000 when the Pocket PC was launched. I remember how much I anticipated the sales figures for the first quarter. I believed we would see a simple, fierce and efficient knock out. The knock out didn't happen. Three years after the launch, I can still in weak moments ask myself unpatiently why things are taking so long. I can wonder why innovation doesn't seem to happen as quickly as I'd want, why competition is let to close in, why sales isn't doing better. Jeff Kirvin recently wrote an article called <a href="http://writingonyourpalm.net/column030609.htm">"Little Orphan Pocket PC"</a> where he concludes: <br />"Basically, it's starting to look like Pocket PC will be Microsoft's version of the Apple Newton. One of the guys in my writer's group still uses his Newton today, but he'll admit that selection and support aren't what they were before Apple abandoned the platform. Are Pocket PC users setting themselves up for a similar future?"<br /><br />In February 2002, I asked myself much the same question in the articles <a href="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=175">"What if..."</a> and <a href="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=208">"Innovate or get hit on the head"</a>. While I still think that Microsoft needs to continue innovating faster and establishing itself as the market leader, it's important to remember that climbing a mountain takes time. Derek Brown (Microsoft) <a href="http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Jun/bpd20030610020332.htm">responds to Jeff's article</a> and briefly describes the expedition thus far. In April 2000, there were three manufacturers with as close to zero market share as you can get. In some markets, Pocket PCs have broken 50 percent market share, world wide 30 and some percent. The Pocket PC Phone Edition is sold by cell phone carriers around the world. Large companies standardize on Pocket PCs and the platform attracts a significant number of developers and independent software vendors. The Smartphone platform is closely related to the Pocket PC platform and the success of one strengthens the other. The latest Smarthpone, <a href="http://www.etaiwannews.com/Business/2003/06/11/1055294609.htm">MiTAC Mio 8380 Smartphone was released yesterday</a> and will be available in China this month and Taiwan in mid-July. Orange, TMN, TeliaSonera, AIS, SMART Communications, and CECT are just some of the carriers currently selling Smartphones. Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile are committed to launching in the near future.<br /><br />All this, and more, in three years. A new Pocket PC version is around the corner. We can expect to see some wishes to come true and some not. Regardless of what the new version delivers, it is still just one of many steps to go to reach the top of the mountain. Climbing a mountain takes time.

[denivan]

Well, climbing a mountain takes much longer if you go three steps forward and two steps back. In my opinion, all the remarks about the absence of a landscape mode, better GUI and usable working versions of pocketword and pocketexcel are correct...Microsoft really missed the ball on this one and even the coolest hardware can't make up for an evidentely aged Operating System. I'm tired of buying expensive third party solutions (textmaker for instance) that give me functionality that should have just been included out of the box...I think Palm has caught up in every way necessary, so I'm not sure what my next PDA will be.

A nice fable about climbing mountains doesn't make up for the PocketPC team sitting on their lazy asses (sorry, but that's really how I feel). If they took the effort to at least visit sites like these, they should know what we want

Kind regards,
Ivan

[Ed Hansberry]

Well, climbing a mountain takes much longer if you go three steps forward and two steps back. In my opinion, all the remarks about the absence of a landscape mode, better GUI and usable working versions of pocketword and pocketexcel are correct...Microsoft really missed the ball on this one and even the coolest hardware can't make up for an evidentely aged Operating System.
With all due respect, this is spoken like a person that has no clue what it takes to develop an operating system. This is not some piece of shareware.

[denivan]

With all due respect, this is spoken like a person that has no clue what it takes to develop an operating system. This is not some piece of shareware.

Due respect taken ;) Off course creating an Operatin System is not an easy task, but hey, this OS fits in 32 Mb's of ROM. Besides, I'm not talking about the WinCE kernel, I'm talking about the GUI additions that PocketPC 2003 should bring to the PDA 'experience'.

I believe PocketPC 2003 will be a great OS 'under the hood', but I don't think that will bring in new buyers, it's the user experience that matters (easy screen rotating, good and working versions of word and excel etc.). To me, these things are what the community has been crying over for a while now, but get no response from the development.

By the way, as I see it, the features I want are a piece of shareware...screen rotating software and text editing software is perfectly managed by third party solutions, at least if MS didn't want to code these solutions, then they could've bought them and included them in ROM (like palm does with doc's to go or whatever it's called).

And could we stop talking about the fact that PocketPC is an OS ? It's not, it's a combination of tools and features that define the difference between a usable tool and a paperweight, the average joe that buys an iPaq, really, really doesn't care which marvellous WinCE kernel might or might not be at the core of a PocketPC, all they care is what they can do with it (or can't in this matter).

[Mike Temporale]

And could we stop talking about the fact that PocketPC is an OS ? It's not, it's a combination of tools and features that define the difference between a usable tool and a paperweight,

So what's WinXP, 2000, 2003 Server, Linux? They are ALL a combination of tools and features that define the difference between a usable tool and a paperweight.

Every OS needs a healthy ISV market.

If you had 3 things to fix in this release, I don't think screen rotation, or textual inputs would fall high on the list. If they did, your sadly missing the future of this device.

The biggest problems with PPC today are Stability, Connectivity, and Power Consumption. If MS really wants to win this, they need to focus on these aspects. Forget the GUI, forget pocket word, or excel. Those all work "good enough" for now. From what I have seen, it looks like MS has focused on making the PPC easy to connect over WiFi / Bluetooth / InfaRed / USB. And addressed Stability by moving to the newer CE4.2, and addressed Power Consumption by moving to a more efficient and streamlined kernel, the newer CE4.2.

Whatever this PPC release holds, I'm not jumping ship because my screen won't rotate, or because MS didn't implement that 1 feature that I must have and don't want to buy from a third party. :roll:

[Sven Johannsen]

As this thread evolves (or devolves ;)), note all the things you will see that MS needs to do to make this the perfect system for any particular individual. Note too, that each will say that is what 'we' all want.

The two posts so far are vastly different in what they believe is neccessary to make the platform 'better'. Over the course of the discussion I bet you find that the PPC needs to be a desktop that fits in your hand and lasts forever away from an outlet. Sort of a miniature tablet PC, that somehow lets you view everything on a small screen, without scrolling BTW, and without requiring 4 power reading glasses (some of us are older you know).

You also have to reconcile including everything that everyone wants with providing a platform/openning for ISVs. It is impossible to please everyone, but including a substandard application for free, does stifle the desire for third parties to enter the market. Look at the number of quality text editors out there that 'replace' Pocket Word, and look at the number of quality Database applications that are out there. I think the total lack of Pocket Access fueled that. Same with PowerPoint.

Upgrading things too often, and maybe too predictably, isn't beneficial either. The PPC is not like a new OS where typically you can just slap the new $100 OS on your existing hardware (though sometimes with less than stellar results). While you are likely going to be able to upgrade to PPC2003 in this case, I bet the new hardware platforms will be compelling. That puts the consumer in the position of buying a new handheld every 12-18 months. I think most aren't ready for that, and many will even resent it. Do it too slowly and you will be acused of stagnation.

Vision and marketing strategy are not simple in this world. While I also have ideas about what should and should not happen to the PPC, I haven't taken the product from 0 market share to almost half in the genre. I have to believe those that did have some clue and some plan.

[Mike Temporale]

As this thread evolves (or devolves ;)), note all the things you will see that MS needs to do to make this the perfect system for any particular individual. Note too, that each will say that is what 'we' all want.

The two posts so far are vastly different in what they believe is neccessary to make the platform 'better'.

Sorry if my post sounds like "we want" post. It wasn't meant to be. I was simply trying to explain, IMO, the changes that Microsoft has made to PPC. (Of course, the changes are only the romoured ones)

Vision and marketing strategy are not simple in this world. While I also have ideas about what should and should not happen to the PPC, I haven't taken the product from 0 market share to almost half in the genre. I have to believe those that did have some clue and some plan.

Well spoken, and that was more what I was trying to get across. I'm sure MS knows that people want this and that, and I'm sure that it's on a list. However you can only do so many things. They have to pick the top fixes, and enhancements while the rest gets put aside. Maybe by the next release these wants will no longer exist, or maybe they will still be too low on the list. I have faith that MS will deliver what is needed for the longer term viability of this platform.

[Mike Temporale]

Jeff Kirvin recently wrote an article called "Little Orphan Pocket PC" (http://writingonyourpalm.net/column030609.htm) where he concludes:
"Basically, it's starting to look like Pocket PC will be Microsoft's version of the Apple Newton. One of the guys in my writer's group still uses his Newton today, but he'll admit that selection and support aren't what they were before Apple abandoned the platform. Are Pocket PC users setting themselves up for a similar future?"

I don't think this is going to happen here. Why would MS have spent all the time and money to incorporate the .Net Compact Framework into VS.Net 2003? They have made it very easy for developers to build applications for mobile platforms, and I can't imagine that it's all for not.

[disconnected]

Unless I misread it, one of the quotes from Derek was that there will be no optimization for xscale. Does this mean no speed improvement, or will speed improvement come in other areas?

[Sven Johannsen]

Unless I misread it, one of the quotes from Derek was that there will be no optimization for xscale. Does this mean no speed improvement, or will speed improvement come in other areas?

Intersting considering the latest front page link to the computerweekly article announcing the realeas date that says "It will also be optimised for Intel's XScale processors. "

Guess we still have to wait to see :)

[Ed Hansberry]

Unless I misread it, one of the quotes from Derek was that there will be no optimization for xscale. Does this mean no speed improvement, or will speed improvement come in other areas?

Intersting considering the latest front page link to the computerweekly article announcing the realeas date that says "It will also be optimised for Intel's XScale processors. "
There are not going to be any X-Scale optimizations.

There may be ARMv5 optimizations, and the X-Scale is in the ARMv5 family, but so is the TI-OMAP processor and I'd wager Samsung is working on ARMv5 processors, though the processors in the 1930/40's are ARMv4 processors, like the StrongARM is.

[denivan]

Hey, what I forgot to mention was this : Off course the PocketPC OS needs improvements in connectivity, stability and speed...and I'm glad to see that they've been working on that. I don't know how the situation is in the US, but most people I see here in Europe aren't powers users, they're just business folk or college professors that bought a PocketPC because of the 'Pocket PC' sound. They're expecting a small PC (including working versions of Office applications) and they don't care or don't know about installing third party applications, they want a solution 'out of the box'. So I'm hoping that these people won't jump ship...cuz' paying 800 USD for a Pocket PC...you expect it to have everything, so if they see that without 3rd party apps, a lower priced Palm can do the same thing, I'm pretty sure they'll think twice about their next PDA buy.

To summ it up : improving an OS isn't the one way or the other, it's a little bit of both : you want to improve the stability of the core, and you want to improve the GUI and included applications...both of these make the PocketPC what it should be, a great user experience...I'm just worried that the development team neglected one part of the improvement, but then again, until 2003 devices roll out, all this is just speculation ;p